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Dekka nodded at Sam. “We’re hoping Sam can contain the swarm.”
Malik frowned. “How exactly would you do that, Sam, if you don’t mind me asking?”
The paramedic had finished stitching Sam’s face—nineteen stitches—and was smearing antibiotic ointment preparatory to bandaging.
Sam said, “May I borrow this?” He slid a pen from her blouse pocket. “I’ve often suspected that whoever, whatever is behind this rock madness has an odd sense of humor. Ever since the dome came down, I’ve been sort of, you know, lost, I guess. So after I took the rock . . .”
Sam tossed the pen toward Malik.
The pen flew and suddenly stopped in midair. Stopped and bounced and rattled a little, rolling back and forth slightly, imprisoned in a transparent sphere less than a foot across. The sphere floated like a soap bubble as Malik and the others gaped in amazement.
Sam flicked a finger, the bubble disappeared, and the pen fell to the floor. “Inside the FAYZ dome, I was a big deal,” Sam said, more wryly self-aware than self-pitying. “My fame came from a dome. And now, I can make domes.”
Malik’s eyes glittered beneath his sleepy lids. “How big can you make it?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Sam said.
“Does it go through solid objects?”
Sam bent down, reeling with dizziness for a moment, picked up the pen, and tossed it again. This time there was a snap! as a small sphere appeared, containing just half of the pen. The other half fell to the floor.
“Cool,” Malik said. “But anything trapped in one of your spheres would still have all its momentum?”
“Sorry?”
“I mean, if you threw a dome over the train, it would still be moving, right? It would smash into the inner side of the sphere?”
Sam shrugged and thought, Oh, good, I get a day away from my brainy wife, and now I’ve got Shade and this dude to make me feel stupid. “Seems so,” he said. “I haven’t exactly done a lot of testing yet.”
Malik thought that over, nodded, and said, “Interesting. Have you ever heard of multiverse theory?”
“I have not,” Sam said. In fact he had, but he was not interested in encouraging a long discussion. At times like these, visions of long white beaches and big, rolling waves came to mind, images of himself on his surfboard. . . . He wasn’t giving that up just to listen to a science lecture.
Dekka came back from speaking with the pilot and said, “They think we’ll intercept the train just as it reaches the Anacostia River, which is the edge of DC.”
“Ow!” Cruz yelped as the paramedic got to work on her.
Shade had pulled it up on her phone. “It’s a railroad bridge over a river, with what looks like marshes on both sides.”
“Good,” Dekka said, nodding. “That’s the place, then. But it’s just too close to the city to have any margin for error.”
Sam locked eyes with her, and in the course of a few seconds much passed between them unspoken. Sam knew what she was asking of him, and so did she. Both knew what Sam had asked of Dekka in years gone by. Sam felt a blush of shame, shame at being relieved that the decision was hers and not his.
And yet, when you do it, it’ll be you, not her, won’t it?
How many innocent people on that train? And how many would survive? What share of the blame would fall on Sam? How would he deal with it?
First see if you survive, then worry about that.
“As soon as we drop in on the train, Vector will know something’s up,” Dekka said. “He could disperse, and then we’re screwed. So as soon as Francis and I—”
“Francis can’t walk,” Armo said gruffly. “You still need one more person, and I’m it.”
Dekka nodded as if she’d been expecting this. “Okay, yeah, one to carry the shell, one to carry Francis. The three of us.”
Shade raised her hand. “Four. There’s some time between when we get there and when Vector can react, right? Not much time, but enough that I can save a few hostages, even if I have to de-bug them.”
“At risk to yourself?” Dekka’s fist clenched by her side, and the next words she spoke seemed to be torn from her against her will. “No. No, Shade, as much as I honor your courage, no. We’re risking Francis, Armo, and me. If something goes wrong, I need you, we all need you to survive.”
